Time: Sun Aug 03 20:21:27 1997
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Date: Sun, 03 Aug 1997 20:18:43 -0700
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From: Paul Andrew Mitchell [address in tool bar]
Subject: SLS: OKLAHOMA BOMBING FALLOUT (fwd)
<snip>
>
> OKLAHOMA BOMBING FALLOUT
>
> Carol Howe Acquittal Raises Question Of Prior Knowledge
>
>
>By Edward Zehr
>
>As the Thompson committee hearings ground on toward the August
>recess last week without major witnesses (most of whom are holed
>up in China or adjacent Pacific Rim countries) and largely
>ignored by the mainstream press (CNN has condescended to provide
>live coverage now that the most interesting part is over), an
>even more obscure story caught the fleeting attention of the
>press lords in Washington and New York: "McVeigh's Lawyers
>Keeping Eye On Bomb Threat Trial in Tulsa," read the headline of
>a Washington Post story by Lois Romano.
>
>The story is about the trials of James Viefhaus, an alleged "
>Nazi sympathizer," and Carol Howe, his former live-in girlfriend,
>described by Romano as "a troubled former debutante from a
>prominent family who fell in with a bad crowd and had a swastika
>tattooed on her arm."
>
>The odd couple were charged with placing a message on their
>answering machine around the end of last year that is alleged to
>contain a bomb threat. They were also charged with possessing
>components that could be used to build a bomb. Viefhaus was
>convicted on these charges after a trial that lasted about a
>week. The trial of Carol Howe took place last week, ending in
>her acquittal on all counts.
>
>The thing that has piqued the interest of the brahmins at the
>Washington Post is Howe's testimony that she "had warned
>authorities that others were talking about blowing up federal
>buildings," information that she had acquired in the course of
>her activities as "an informer for the federal Bureau of
>Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF)." This, according to Mrs.
>Romano, who is married to a federal judge, has made Howe "a cause
>celebre for lawyers of convicted Oklahoma City bomber Timothy J.
>McVeigh and far-right conspiracy theorists."
>
>Now, a story such as this, appearing in an establishment rag such
>as The Washington Post, might be cause for alarm to the
>"federales," (as they are known to us skulking brutes of the "far
>right") if the story had been pursued in that old-time tradition
>of investigative reporting typified by Woodward, Berstein, Deep
>Throat, et al. But the feds really have little need to worry
>about this article, which merits their Good Hush-keeping Seal of
>Approval. The goodguys and badguys have been clearly labeled for
>the benefit of those unfamiliar with the cheer-the-hero, hiss-
>the- villain conventions of mainstream journalism and the story
>has been rigorously spun to government specs.
>
>Still, Mrs. Romano does let drop the revelation that Howe's
>lawyers contend she was charged -- three months after Viefhaus --
>in order to silence her when it became known that she intended to
>testify at the trial of Tim McVeigh, who was accused and
>subsequently convicted of bombing the Murrah Building in Oklahoma
>City.
>
>McVeigh's attorney, Stephen Jones, offered his succinct opinion
>regarding the federal government's reason for indicting Carol
>Howe: "They wanted to make her a Typhoid Mary in the McVeigh
>trial."
>
>Mike Vanderboegh who edits The John Doe Times, an electronic
>publication devoted largely to reprints of articles on the
>Oklahoma bombing and related matters, with occasional commentary
>by the editor, mentioned recently that the feds had sent the head
>of the Domestic Terrorism Section of the FBI to testify at "the
>little two-bit bomb threat" trials of Viefhaus and Howe. "Is
>there something more important here than they are letting on?" he
>asks.
>
>Mrs. Romano tells us the prosecutors have assured the court that
>"the Oklahoma City attack has no bearing on the charges against
>Howe and have asked U.S. District Judge Michael Burrage to bar
>all references to it at her trial." She adds that neither side is
>able to comment on this "because a 'gag' order is in place."
>
>Another gag order -- just as the one imposed upon the April 24
>pre-trial hearing of Howe and Viefhaus was lifted, allowing a
>70-page transcript of the hearings, previously sealed by the
>court, to be made public. J.D. Cash, writing in the July 22
>McCurtain (Idabel, Oklahoma) Gazette, reveals that the transcript
>"suggest[s] the federal agency had advance warning of an
>impending attack on a federal building in Oklahoma City."
>
>"At the hearing on April 24," writes Cash, "Howe attorney Clark
>Brewster was seeking an order from Federal District Judge Michael
>Burrage to release Howe's ATF reports and other investigative
>materials related to her undercover work for the government."
>
>Burrage declined to do so, saying:
>
>"With that McVeigh trial going on, I don't want anything getting
>out of here that would compromise that trial in any way."
>
>Whereupon he sealed the transcript. That prompted Brewster to
>ask:
>
>"What do you mean by compromise? Do you mean share with the
>McVeigh defense?"
>
>"Yes," replied Burrage, "or something that would come up - you
>know, we have got evidence that the ATF took a trip with somebody
>that said buildings were going to be blown up in Oklahoma City
>before it was blown up or something of that nature and try to
>connect it to McVeigh in some way or something."
>
>Carol Howe's testimony at the McVeigh trial was subsequently
>disallowed by the presiding judge, Richard Matsch. Thus, in a
>case based largely on circumstantial evidence that McVeigh had
>the motive and means to blow up the Murrah Building, the defense
>was denied the opportunity to present circumstantial evidence
>that others had the motive and the means to do so as well. The
>reason Judge Matsch gave for cutting the defense off at the knees
>was that he didn't want to "confuse the jury."
>
>This was in keeping with the overall kangaroo court atmosphere of
>the proceeding. Early in the McVeigh trial one juror told his
>colleagues, "We all know what the verdict should be." Fans of
>"L.A. Law" might consider this grounds for a mistrial, or at
>least for replacing the outspokenly biased juror, but not Judge
>Matsch. He declined to hold hearings, or take any action on the
>matter. Responding to a complaint by the defense that pretrial
>publicity had poisoned the jury pool after the Dallas Morning
>News had published excerpts of documents stolen from the defense
>team's computer, including an alleged confession by the
>defendant, His Honor replied that he considered it "unwise to
>presume" that the entire jury pool was prejudiced.
>
>Following the Viefhaus trial, during which reams of racist
>literature were placed in evidence, along with photos of Viefhaus
>and Howe in Nazi regalia, an alternate juror was quoted as saying
>that "such evidence caused him to want to vote to convict
>Viefhaus because of his political leanings," according to J.D.
>Cash. "The juror said he did not think the couple really intended
>to bomb any cities, as the message predicted. But he felt the
>couple were a danger to the community," Cash wrote.
>
>Howe's attorney, Clark Brewster, protested that the introduction
>of this material was "an attempt by the prosecution to 'smear'
>Howe's character and convict her because of her one-time
>political beliefs," according to the Tulsa World.
>
>The World reported that, "Brewster, who claims that Howe gathered
>the material as part of her informant duties, said the evidence
>was 'calculated' to get the jury to fear his client and put
>jurors in a mindset to send her to prison, even if the government
>does not prove the bomb threat and possible pipe bomb counts."
>
>Shortly before the McVeigh trial was to begin in March Brewster
>questioned Angela (Finley) Graham, who had "run" Howe as an
>undercover agent for the ATF, regarding the intelligence project
>Howe had undertaken involving Andreas Strassmeir, Dennis Mahon
>and Elohim City.
>
>Referring to Andreas Strassmeir, Brewster asked about "the kind
>of threats he made about wanting to blow up federal buildings?
>You were interested in that, weren't you?"
>
>Graham gave a somewhat circuitous affirmative answer, prompting
>Brewster to inquire: "And Ms. Howe told you about Mr.
>Strassmeir's threats to blow up federal buildings, didn't she?"
>
>"In general, yes."
>
>"And that was before the Oklahoma City bombing?"
>
>"Yes."
>
>Mrs. Romano writes that, "Federal prosecutors in the McVeigh case
>have said privately that Howe never reported useful specific
>information in advance of the Oklahoma City bombing, although
>she adds that "Angela Graham, confirmed during a pretrial hearing
>that during that time Howe did tell her 'in general' that certain
>Elohim City residents spoke of bombing buildings."
>
>However, the Tulsa World reported on July 30:
>
> "In a July 16 hearing in the Howe case, Brewster claimed that
> -- before the Oklahoma City bombing -- Howe had warned the
> ATF that residents of the far eastern Oklahoma religious
> compound known as Elohim City were talking of a "cataclysm"
> in the spring of 1995 and that federal buildings in Oklahoma
> City or Texas were being targeted."
>
>According to J.D. Cash, "evidence is contained in government
>documents outlining plans in February, 1995, for Strassmeir's
>imminent arrest by agents of the Tulsa office of the ATF."
>
>But the arrest did not take place. Cash wrote, "For reasons yet
>to be explained, that arrest--planned for two months before the
>Oklahoma City bombing--was postponed, and in the wake of the
>bombing, apparently scrubbed."
>
>Writing in the McCurtain Gazette, Cash alleged, "The Gazette has
>also located evidence that Strassmeir was immediately fingered as
>a suspect in the Oklahoma City bombing, but was inexplicably
>allowed to live in this country for nine months following the
>tragedy, without being interviewed by the FBI."
>
>The London Telegraph's Washington bureau chief, Ivo Dawnay
>recently wrote:
>
> "What is most worrying for prosecuting attorneys is that Howe
> claims little knowledge of Tim McVeigh. Instead she
> identified from descriptions several other Elohim figures,
> including Mahon, Strassmeir and a bank robber, Michael
> Brescia, as likely bombers. But to date, although the FBI is
> said to have spoken to more than 20,000 individuals in
> America's most extensive criminal inquiry, Mahon has yet to
> be interviewed. Strassmeir, another suspect named by Howe,
> has been only cursorily interviewed in Germany by telephone."
>
>Strassmeir, the son of a prominent German political figure, has
>been barred from re-entering the U. S. by the State Department.
>He has been living in Dublin, Ireland since last February and is
>said to be "socializing in Sinn Fein circles," according to the
>Dublin Sunday Times.
>
>The problem for the feds is that this doesn't look right -- it
>just doesn't make sense. Why would the federal authorities
>protect a person such as Strassmeir, even ignoring the fact that
>his visa had expired and he was living in this country illegally?
>Was it because of his father's political influence? If that were
>the case wouldn't it be logical to suppose that they would have
>whisked him out of the country as soon as it became known that he
>was cavorting with a bunch of self-styled Nazis instead of
>allowing him to remain in their company for months after the
>Oklahoma bombing -- to get into who knows what kind of trouble?
>
>The feds have never even attempted to explain their special
>treatment of Strassmeir which makes absolutely no sense unless
>one assumes that he was working for them. The same can be said of
>Mahon. Why would the federal authorities not interview him, of
>all people, unless they were already getting his reports? After
>all, he had been named by an undercover agent as a major
>conspirator in the Oklahoma bombing -- and they were interviewing
>hundreds of people who had been erroneously identified on the
>basis of police sketches, who had no other connection with the
>incident.
>
>One point that seemed to particularly annoy Mr. Vanderboegh was
>the Washington Post's slapdash account of Carol Howe's
>recruitment by the ATF. According to Mrs. Romano:
>
> "Mahon said that he first met Howe in 1993 when she wrote him
> to say that she was interested in the white supremacist group
> in which Mahon has been active. By August, 1994, however,
> Howe was reporting to the ATF about Mahon's activities. It
> is unclear when--or even if--she went from sympathizer to
> informer."
>
>Since Mahon had been accused by Howe of plotting to blow up
>federal buildings, he might not be the most objective source of
>information for so critical a detail as this. Nor does his
>standing as a former official of the Ku Klux Klan (unmentioned in
>Romano's account) particularly enhance his credibility.
>
>Ivo Dawnay writes that Howe drifted into the white racist
>movement after being accosted by three black youths. According to
>one account, she was thrown off a high structure, breaking both
>heels, and still has difficulty walking. It was after that
>incident she contacted a racist hotline operated by Dennis Mahon,
>"a leader of the so-called White Aryan Resistance group, linked
>to an Oklahoma commune of extremists called Elohim City,"
>according to Dawnay.
>
>Dawnay goes on to say that, "After allegedly being sexually
>assaulted by Mahon, she filed an Emergency Protective Order
>against him, thereby alerting the interest of the ATF." After
>being approached by ATF agent Angela Finley, Howe agreed to act
>as an informant for the bureau, infiltrating the White Aryan
>Resistance enclave at Elohim City and reporting on their plans to
>bomb a federal building.
>
>Thus, it is not at all unclear when Howe "went from sympathizer
>to informer." However, the telling of this part of the story
>would not have been convenient to Mrs. Romano, who had cast Miss
>Howe as one of the villains of the piece. The image she sought to
>portray was that of a flaky, gooned-out debutante who just sort
>of sleepwalked her way to becoming a "racist terrorist."
>
>But the stickiest point of all is given in the following
>observation by Mrs. Romano:
>
> "An ATF agent has testified that she terminated Howe in 1995
> because Howe was associating with skinheads and appeared to
> be mentally unstable."
>
>A covert agent consorting with "skinheads?" Shocking. Surely
>undercover informants are supposed to associate only with upright
>members of the community whose reputations are above reproach --
>members of the chamber of commerce and the clergy, for example.
>Agent Howe has let the side down with her awkward taste in
>socializing.
>
>But then, what is one to expect? According to "an ATF agent" Howe
>"appeared to be mentally unstable." One might wonder about the
>qualifications of a random ATF agent to render such psychiatric
>opinions, but in this case all such speculation would necessarily
>be idle -- Mrs. Romano has neglected to give us the agent's
>identity, much less details of the agent's medical education and
>time spent studying in Zurich.
>
>McVeigh's attorney, Stephen Jones, noted that Howe had filed 70
>reports while working undercover for the ATF in 1995 and had made
>more than 47 undercover tape recordings of white supremacists.
>She also took numerous polygraph tests. According to Jones, "She
>passed the polygraph according to the reports. They evaluated her
>credibility and found her to be a reliable, credible informant."
>
>Altogether Howe is said to have passed 14 polygraph tests while
>working as an ATF agent. One wonders how many polygraph tests her
>handler Angela (Finley) Graham could pass. Testifying during the
>Viefhaus trial, Graham acknowledged that Howe had been
>"reactivated" following the Oklahoma bombing, but that this
>merely reflects how "desperate" the government was to catch those
>responsible for the bombing. (So desperate that they didn't have
>time to interview Strassmeir or Mahon?) Howe maintains that she
>had never been notified that she was "deactivated" (in March of
>1995 according to Graham).
>
>According to the Tulsa World, "The government acknowledges that
>ATF records reflect that Howe was an informant through Dec. 13,
>the day a search warrant was executed at the east Tulsa house
>Viefhaus and Howe shared."
>
>Under questioning, Graham admitted that the records of the ATF
>show that Howe worked for them as an informant through 1996, but
>said that was only because her superiors would not permit her to
>close the books on Howe. Their reasoning, according to Graham,
>was that they did not want "to destroy any records that related
>to the Oklahoma City investigation."
>
>In other words, the only way these brain-locked bureaucrats could
>indicate in their records that an informant was no longer active
>was to destroy the records? It is difficult to believe that even
>an outfit as dorkey as the ATF would maintain so ridiculous a
>system of record keeping. Supposing the activities of a
>deactivated agent became relevant to some future, unanticipated
>prosecution -- would they just shrug and tell the prosecutor,
>"Sorry, we destroyed all the records on that"? Or do they simply
>carry all of their deactivated informants on the records as
>active? Perhaps more to the point, do they really know who is
>active and who isn't? In this case, the issue would seem to turn
>on the word of Agent Graham alone.
>
>It was, Graham said, warming to the subject, the only instance
>she could recall during the course of her career with the ATF
>that someone "so unstable" had been called back into service as
>an undercover agent.
>
>And what reason was given for the conclusion that Howe was
>"unstable?" In February 1995 she stayed four hours in a local
>mental health facility where she had gone in a state of
>depression. According to the Tulsa World, "Howe said she
>subsequently got therapy for depression she said was brought on
>by pressure from the ATF and the death of a child she knew in a
>house fire."
>
>Under cross-examination Agent Graham admitted that she is not
>qualified to judge whether or not a person is mentally unstable.
>
>The Tulsa World reported that "The prosecution also introduced
>evidence of a bizarre incident in March 1995 in which Howe
>allegedly reported that she was "pistol-whipped" by a black man."
>
>Is this supposed to be further evidence of Howe's unsuitability
>as an undercover agent? Wasn't it just such an incident that
>convinced the ATF of her suitability as an agent and prompted
>them to contact her with an offer of employment?
>
>The prosecution's entire case is riddled with such instances of
>double-think. Agent Graham decides that Howe is a mental basket
>case, totally incompetent to do the dangerous work of an
>undercover informant, so what does she do? She packs Howe off to
>Elohim City to find out who blew up the Murrah Building, knowing
>full well that she stands a good chance of being maimed or
>killed, and that her information will likely be worthless anyway,
>since she is so "undependable." Perhaps it's time Agent Graham
>had her own mental stability checked -- she could have it done
>while waiting for the results of her polygraph tests.
>
>Under cross-examination, Howe's attorney Clark Brewster was able
>to elicit testimony from several FBI agents, "that showed Carol
>Howe was highly regarded by the ATF and by some FBI agents,"
>according to the Tulsa World. Even Agent Graham was moved to
>write a threat assessment after the FBI blew Howe's cover by
>leaking her identity to McVeigh's defense team. The Tulsa World
>reported that, "In the assessment, Finley-Graham wrote that in
>the two years she had known Ms. Howe she never appeared to be
>overly paranoid or fearful and that her belief that she is in
>serious danger was likely real. Finley-Graham's advice to Howe
>was to take every precaution necessary to protect herself."
>
>Agent Graham went on to emphasize the importance of Howes' work
>writing that she had been "the key in identifying individuals at
>Elohim City which is tied to the Oklahoma City bomb case."
>
>There would seem to have been a change in the game plan between
>then and now. Could this be related to the fact that survivors of
>the Oklahoma bombing have filed a million dollar lawsuit against
>Graham for "failure to act" in a timely fashion to prevent the
>tragedy, or is she just being a good team player?
>
>Perhaps most damaging to the government's case was the testimony
>of FBI agent Peter Rickel. The Tulsa World summarized the impact
>of his testimony:
>
> "The testimony had the effect of showing that Ms. Howe was
> still an active ATF informant and highly thought of. So much
> so that even the FBI was calling her for information, long
> after the Oklahoma City bombing. It also showed, that Ms.
> Howe was caught in a government run-around. The agency she
> worked for took her fears seriously but told her to go to the
> FBI. The FBI told her to go to the ATF. And no one did
> anything to protect her. Rickel then admitted, that given
> those facts it would have been an option for Ms. Howe to
> continue her work as a member of the white supremacist
> movement."
>
>The physical evidence was described by FBI agent Ken Kaminski,
>who took part in the December 1996 raid on the residence of
>Viefhaus and Howe. He described "a length of pipe with end caps,
>containers marked powder, cannon fuse, citric acid and hexamine
>tablets," according to press reports. Under cross-examination
>Kaminski conceded that "the citric acid was a retail item that is
>used to can vegetables and the hexamine tablets are used to start
>camp fires. The pipe with end caps turned out to be empty," the
>Tulsa World reported.
>
>And then there is the "bomb threat" on Viefhaus's answering
>machine. It reads:
>
> "A letter from a high-ranking revolutionary commander has
> been written and received demanding that action be taken
> against the government by all white warriors by Dec. 15,
> 1996, and if this action is not taken bombs will be activated
> in 15 pre-selected U.S. cities."
>
>Agent Rickel, when asked on the witness stand "whether CBS News
>anchorman Dan Rather would be arrested if he said the same words
>on the air," at first offered the opinion that Rather would be
>subject to prosecution, but then backed off and reversed himself,
>saying that Rather's status as a newsman made the situation
>different.
>
>So much for the Bill of Rights. It's good of the FBI to let us
>know that multi-millionaire talking heads are accorded rights and
>privileges that are not shared by us mere commoners. Perhaps one
>day the agency will find the time to point out the exact section
>of the Constitution where this is spelled out. The intellectual
>acumen of FBI agents would seem to have plummeted drastically
>since the "bad old days" of J. Edgar. No doubt the agency has had
>to take on its share of tragic victims of the American
>educational system.
>
>The one thing that really stands out about these trials is the
>pervasive smell of baloney. If Viefhaus really intended to bomb
>15 U.S. cities he surely wasn't going to do it with the odds and
>ends found in the search of his residence. Perhaps it would be in
>order to test for mental instability all around, starting with
>the jury that convicted him. The man's politics may be odious and
>more than a little bit nutty, but that is hardly a reason to send
>him to prison. His conviction is a bit of a puzzle in light of
>Howe's acquittal since the evidence presented against both
>defendants is identical.
>
>The trial of Carol Howe was a no-brainer. She was acquitted on
>all charges Friday night after the jury had deliberated for less
>than six hours. This is certain to have repercussions -- a grand
>jury that will reconvene this month in Oklahoma City is
>considering the possibility that a much larger conspiracy was
>involved in the bombing of the Murrah Building than the federal
>government is willing to admit. Howe's acquittal lends credence
>to this theory.
>
>The motivation of the federal authorities in bringing charges
>against Howe is as obvious as their motive for failing to pursue
>most of the conspirators involved in the bombing the Murrah
>Building -- they are attempting to cover their plush posteriors.
>The feds had prior knowledge of the Oklahoma bombing and failed
>to prevent it, just as they did with the bombing of the World
>Trade Center. About the only positive thing that can be said of
>this fiasco is that it provides yet another excellent reason to
>abolish the ATF.
>
>
>
>
> Published in the Aug. 4, 1997 issue of The Washington Weekly
> Copyright 1997 The Washington Weekly (http://www.federal.com)
> Reposting permitted with this message intact
>
<snip>
========================================================================
Paul Andrew Mitchell : Counselor at Law, federal witness
B.A., Political Science, UCLA; M.S., Public Administration, U.C. Irvine
tel: (520) 320-1514: machine; fax: (520) 320-1256: 24-hour/day-night
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